Strawberry Jam

It’s strawberry season in the Northwest! And that means it’s finally jam time! I grew up eating only homemade freezer jam—I remember one time that we ran out of jam when I was a kid and tried buying Smuckers or something and, well, my whole family hated it. The last time I made jam was when we lived here in Oregon in 2009; in the meantime F’s grandma and my mom have given us a couple of jars but overall we’ve been trying to make do with the store bought… stuff.

If I’m really honest, that’s basically meant that I have skipped eating jam entirely for years. Since we have freezer access and it’s fruit season, it’s jam time. I bought a flat of Hood strawberries and got to work.

I used SureJell pectin and made two batches of the regular type (aka high sugar) and tried one of the Low/No Sugar pectin packets (the pink ones with a lot less sugar). I sampled both and they’re delicious. I love how freezer jam just tastes like fruit.

We’re now stocked up with strawberry jam for the year but I’m looking forward to making raspberry and blackberry jams later in the summer. I also think I’m that since the standard commercial pectins (SureJell, Ball, and MCP) all include dextrose I’m going to try Pomona’s Universal Pectin this summer. (Seriously, what’s the point of making low(er) sugar jam when there’s already a sugar in your base?)